


sour milk

by oemori



Series: dusk is falling [2]
Category: Red vs. Blue
Genre: A long conversation between two stubborn idiots, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Felix survives, Gen, Implied felix/locus - Freeform, Implied/Referenced Suicide, M/M, Metaphors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-12
Updated: 2019-06-12
Packaged: 2020-05-02 06:23:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19193488
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/oemori/pseuds/oemori
Summary: “You like hurting people,” Washington repeats.“Uh, yeah.” It's an easy answer because it's not a lie.“But did you like hurting Locus?” Washington asks.Felix blinks. He opens his mouth to say ‘yes,’ but the word sticks in his throat. That question, surprisingly, does not have such an easy answer.





	sour milk

The safehouse in Alcra’s capital is, if Felix remembers correctly, ugly, cramped, and filled with enough dust to kill an asthmatic. Located down an alley a mere half mile from Alcra’s prize wharf, tucked behind a butcher’s shop and a strip club, it's perfectly discreet in all the right ways. Easy to find, too — it's been a while, but Felix has spent enough time on Alcra that, even after several years off-planet, he can still remember its twisting streets pretty damn well.

Felix hikes the steps of the fire escape outside of the red brick apartment building with a practiced ease, counting floors until he reaches the fourth one. The rightmost window to the apartment never locked properly, and the latch needs only a little fiddling with Felix’s pocket knife before it clicks open. Just as easy as he remembers.

The window creaks as Felix pushes it up. Instinctively, he grimaces, but he doesn't waste any effort trying to disguise the sound; no one's probably been here in years. Felix used to keep close tabs on their safe houses, and despite untrustworthy windows, this one had never been much of a worry. Too dingy. Besides, there's enough noise from the wharf to drown out a siren, let alone a rusty window.

Still, old habits die hard. He slips through the window and his heavy boots land soundlessly on the hardwood floor. 

“Alright,” Felix mutters, yanking the window shut behind him. He claps his hands together in anticipation of the cloud of dust that should be coating them.

And he pauses. Felix sniffs. The air of the apartment — air that he remembers leaving his spit blackened — is clean. He flips up his palms: dust-free.

“What…” he mutters, turning his hands back and forth. Felix turns and strips a finger across the top of the windowsill. It comes back mostly unaffected, only the tip turned a light, powdery gray. He rubs his index finger against his thumb and glances behind him at the familiar sight of the apartment’s living room.

It's strange. Despite the lack of visible particulate, the air smells the same. The layout of the living room is unchanged: same ugly red couch, same broken TV. Same dirty old glory box beside the front door, padlocked and coated with dried mud and shoe prints. Same bookshelf filled with paperback romance novels. Even the weird yellow crab picture is still hanging up above the door, its center pocked by water damage and uneven paint strokes.

Same stuff, same vibe. But no dust motes swirl in the light filtering through the windows. No dust covers the floor in a thick, matte film.

It shouldn't be so disconcerting. Maybe Alcra has simply taken up a rigorous, clean air initiative. Besides, Felix thinks, at least this way he doesn't have to worry about leaving visible marks on everything he touches. Because touch, he will. 

He heads further into the apartment, pausing only when he notices that his books have been removed from the bookshelf behind the couch. Gone are the dog eared paperbacks that he used to read on stormy nights; the bookshelf looks too empty now, cluttered only by a few half-stacks of dime novels. Many of them have unfamiliar titles. It makes him feel strange; he lifts a hand and rubs firmly at his sternum, using the other to look through some of the books with uncracked spines.

He picks one up, absently reading the title and studying the deep red cover, before he abruptly comes back to his senses. He slaps the book down onto the stack and moves on, resisting the urge to go back and check inside the cover for a receipt. Locus used to like to tuck them into the books he bought so he could use the scraps of paper as bookmarks —

Felix blinks. He grimaces. Being in this safehouse is making him stupid. Locus didn't buy new books recently, he scolds himself, the apartment being clean doesn't mean _anything, and you're being a total idiot._

Besides, Locus had never been one for dusting. In their safehouse-hopping days, Felix had been the one more likely to break out a vacuum or an off-brand swiffer, sick of the way his allergies reared up any time even the most basic practices of environmental hygiene were neglected. But even Felix had never tried to tackle the omnipresent dirtiness that this safe house had presented. It always seemed inevitable, practically engrained into the red brick walls.

And yet, here he is, he thinks as he glances down at his feet: here he is, leaving muddy footprints on a shining, polished floor.

As much as he wants to deny it, _someone_ cleaned up. And recently. And if it wasn't Locus, then — Felix grimaces — then who the _fuck_ is living in his apartment?

There's too many rooms and Felix has too little time to check each one, but the kitchen is an easy reach from the living room. Upon turning the corner his fears are confirmed; the refrigerator is humming audibly, tucked beside the doorframe and covered with oily magnets and neon pink post-it notes. The running refrigerator is a direct contradiction of one of the final steps of Felix and Locus’ leaving-house ritual: in which they would turn off the fridge and remove all of Felix’s post-it “reminders.”

Speaking of which. Felix pauses to peel one of the sticky notes off the fridge. To his surprise, it's being held in place not by the post-it’s adhesive backing, but by a folded slice of tape. Not only that, but the writing on it is faded and a bit blurry. He glances at the other notes; they all appear in similar states of agedness.

Makes sense, Felix realizes as he looks back down at the one in his hand. “ _AIR CONDITIONER BROKEN 08/25_ ” it reads, written in Felix’s own handwriting. They're some of his old notes, pieces of a past that should have quite literally been thrown out.

He has no idea what they're doing there. Felix had usually been pretty careful about tossing them, and Locus used to chew him out for forgetting to discard anything that counted as a personal affect. They would have triple checked every inch of this apartment before leaving. So how —

He chokes the thought before it takes root, unwilling to waste time over something as trivial as a couple of post-its. Instead, Felix plucks all of his notes off the fridge — “ _out of butter, salt, pancake mix, 223 ammo,” “interview 10/06 @Mo,” “LOCUS IS AN ASSHOLE!!!! DO NOT REMOVE”_ — and shoves them in his pocket. They settle over his hip with a weird sort of weight, and he resolves to throw them into the first dumpster that he comes across. Or maybe even into Alcra’s ocean, or out of the airlock when he's traveling through deep space…So many options. 

But he can lose sleep over the whole mess later.

Felix throws open the fridge door; there, right in front of his face, is a jug of imported milk. He reaches in and rotates it until he finds what he's looking for.

The expiration date: very recently passed. Someone was — or still is — living in this apartment.

Felix closes the fridge harder than he probably should.

It's instinct that brings him to his old room, and his feet have already crossed the carpeted floor of the hallway by the time his brain fully catches up. The familiar door to his room is shut; when he rattles the handle, it stays that way. Felix’s brows furrow and he kneels, inspecting the rusty door handle.

Locked from the outside. Easy money.

Felix gives himself no time to wonder why his room would be locked up in the first place. In fact, by the time he realizes the strangeness of the situation, his knife is already jammed into the keyhole. Same as the window, it takes only a bit of maneuvering before the lock gives and clicks open.

“Bingo,” Felix mutters, stashing his knife as he straightens up. The feeling of unease only gets stronger as he faces the door, becoming a kind of trepidation that comes with expecting something to rear up and bite you in the ass. Felix shakes his head. He flattens his palm against the polished wood of the door.

Slowly, he pushes it open.

Nothing happens.

The breath that sighs from Felix’s lungs in reaction to the empty room is embarrassingly loud. He clicks his tongue and shoves the door open wider so it bangs into the wall, tamping down the urge to roll his eyes as he makes an immediate beeline for the closet. The padlock code Felix installed on this lock is the same as all his others — EFXI — and the heavy chain clicks open and slips to the floor with a rattling thud. No problem.

Felix kicks it away with the side of his foot and yanks open the door.

The arsenal that greets him is beautiful.

“Hel- _lo_ ,” Felix drawls, reaching in to grab the barrel of a large rifle. He pulls the gun from the closet and turns it in his hands. Pleased by the lack of wear, Felix tosses it behind him onto the room’s resident stripped mattress.

And then he gets to work.

There's a large black duffle stored in the back of the closet, and with a lot of muffled swearing and careful maneuvering, he manages to work it out from where it was wedged beneath and behind several collapsing cardboard boxes. He shakes out the bag. It's wrinkled and a bit dirty, but there's no holes in it and the tough fabric shows no troubling wear and tear.

He unzips the bag and spreads it out beside where he tossed the rifle, atop the moth-eaten mattress that Felix can't believe he used to willingly sleep on.

For a fleeting moment, he flashes back to years ago, when this bag was newer and held a lot more than just weapons. Felix trails a fingertip over the pocket where he used to keep his toothbrush. He unzips the one where he used to store his smuggled ondansetron.

And then he flips open the mouth of the bag itself, searching the lining for something. It doesn't take long to find it. There's a set of tiny initials stitched into the underside of the main zipper; a tiny _I_ beside a lopsided _G_ , done in black thread with what, at the time, had been clumsy, bandaged fingers.

Locus’ work. A job undertaken while they were lying low, trapped in a safehouse beside the sea. A surprisingly good way to retrain fine motor skills, and an even better way to pass the time. Felix still remembers how Locus had looked, focusing intently on the tiny stitches, uncaring of the storm raging outside.

Back then, things had been simpler. Felix had still called Locus ‘ _Sam_ ’. And Locus had still called Felix his partner.

Felix digs a fingernail into the letters and thinks of how easily it would be to tear them out. But no matter how much he may want to, he can't bring himself to do it.

He hates himself for being so sentimental.

Felix picks up the rifle from where it sits on the mattress and carefully sets it within the duffle.

He adds a few more guns and a couple of knives to the bag and then, a wickedly sharp bowie in one hand, leans further in to the closet to look for shotgun shells. He's down on one knee pushing aside boxes of scattered 223s and 308s, mindful of the knife in his right hand, when something catches his eye, glinting in the light that filters in from the window to his back.

Felix leans out of the closet.

Dust motes.

The rest of the house had been clean. But this room —

 _His_ room —

Shit. Someone _has_ been cleaning.

Something behind Felix clicks.

“You picked the wrong place to rob, buddy,” a familiar voice says. “Hands where I can see them. And drop the goddamn knife.”

 

—

 

The AC kicks on.

Felix leaves the knife on the ground and slowly rises to his feet, his back to the doorway and the man standing in it. Not that there’s any question who it is; Felix would recognize that voice anywhere, helmet or not. The knowledge of who it is, though — that makes his blood boil.

“Agent Washington,” Felix greets, unable to keep hatred from dripping from his voice. His lungs feel full of mud; he wishes that he had some of that ondansetron right about now. The nausea in his gut is downright suffocating. “What an unpleasant surprise.”

He hears a faint rattle; the sound of a gun lowering in shock and then snapping back to attention. Felix gains a little bit of satisfaction from knowing that he spooked him. 

“What —” Washington stammers. 

Felix slowly turns to face him, eyes lowered, hands lifted just above his shoulders. He takes a few solid moments of bracing before he looks up, breathing deeply through the heaviness in his torso. Unfortunately, no amount of mindful breathing will ever be enough to curb the dizzying pulse of anger that hits him when he finally looks Washington in the eye.

His eyes are that same watery blue that Felix remembers, red-tinged and pale. There's a few fresh scars littering the flushed skin of his cheeks. His hands are steady where they aim the barrel of his barrel rifle straight at the hollow of Felix’s throat. But he looks older and a lot more run down than Felix remembers; freshly gaunt, like his life has recently gone downhill. Felix takes comfort in that.

“How —” Washington growls, glaring at Felix as if he could cause him to spontaneously combust through sheer willpower alone. Felix glances down at where his pointer finger flexes against the trigger. “How do you know my name?”

Of course Wash doesn't recognize him. Felix rolls his eyes. The knife he left on the floor sits innocently beside his foot, just waiting to be kicked to his hand.

And _God_ , it would be so _easy_ to kill Washington, to rush him and sink the bowie deep into his throat while the man still considers him an unlucky, nameless burglar. It would probably feel great, as stabbing people usually does. Even better, since Wash would be the one at the end of his knife.

But something stops him. Something strange and bone-deep, a weariness that feels more like congealed anger than lack of sleep. A hatred that's curdled and gone bad.

It’s the same damn thing that ended his singleminded hunt of Locus. And it's the thing that will ultimately get him killed. An emptiness. A lack of self-preservation.

An acknowledgement.

_‘…Only one of you needs the other —’_

Christ, Felix is exhausted. This was supposed to be easy. 

“You know,” Felix says, uncaring. He turns away from Washington and ducks back down into the closet, resuming his search for those damn shotgun shells. Wash stutters some sort of angry protest, but Felix is already tuning out the boorish whine of his voice. “Your milk went bad a few days ago. Might want to throw it out soon. A- _ha_.”

He pulls out the marked box of shells and shakes it. It rattles in a way that suggests that it's more empty than full, but a few bullets is always better than no bullets. Felix dumps the box into the duffle bag.

“What the fuck are you doing?” Wash demands.

“What does it look like I'm doing?” Felix rolls his eyes. He grabs his knife off the floor and dives back in, on the hunt for the brick of C4 he's pretty sure he stashed beneath a floorboard.

“I have a _gun_ to your _back_ ,” Wash says. He sounds bewildered now beneath all the anger and exasperation. “And you're still, what — are you tearing up the floor?!”

“Yup,” Felix pops the “p,” using his knife to pry up another plank. The worn piece of wood catches on a stubborn nail and cracks in half. He peeks beneath it; still no dice. “Damn.”

“Who the fuck are you?” Washington explodes.

Felix knows the sound of a man at the end of his rope. And based purely on the sudden uptick of Wash’s voice, Felix is pretty damn sure that the freelancer is a mere quip away from unloading his rifle into Felix’s back. Still, he's not sure if explaining himself would actually serve to ameliorate the tenseness of the situation. It might actually make it worse.

It would _probably_ make it worse.

“You know, I was wondering who cleaned up the place,” Felix says, tossing aside the broken plank. “It never used to be this clean. One time Locus and I stayed here for a few months and I _swear_ I got black lung.”

“Felix,” he hears Washington murmur. The name falls from his tongue like an accident, spoken so softly that it's almost like Wash is afraid that speaking it aloud will make it true. 

Well, tough shit.

Felix lets his mouth do the talking, brain preoccupied with finishing the task at hand ASAP. “Locus always hated cleaning, but _Christ_ , I couldn't stand all the dust. We ended up buying this nice — well, I say _we_ , but I'm the one who bought it. Anyways, I bought this nice vacuum —”

“You're Felix,” Washington says again, louder this time. “But — you're dead. You're supposed to be dead.”

Felix looks over his shoulder and shoots Washington a look.

“No shit,” Felix deadpans. “I am?”

“You died! I watched you die!” Washington is adamant. He looks seconds away from pacing. “You fell from the tower, the sword — it — am I going insane here?”

“My heart stopped for a few minutes, I'll give you that.” Felix gives up on the C4. “But I had a healing unit in my armor. It kicked my heart back online and kept me alive just long enough for someone to find me.”

Felix shoves the torn up planks back into the gaping holes in the floor and shuffles to his feet. He drops the bowie knife onto the bed beside the duffle bag, blinking when the blade catches the light streaming in from the nearby window and sends it straight into one of his eyes.

“Locus,” Washington echoes, like he's trying to fill in the blanks. “Locus found you.”

Felix snorts, opening up the bag to try and organize all the stuff he’s dumped into it.

“Some kid soldiers, actually. Carted me off to a nearby MTF. Didn't recognize me, thought I was another citizen caught up in the draft. Asked who I was, and I told them I had amnesia.” Felix barks a laugh. “ _Amnesia_. Anyways, one thing led to another, and after a few months I'm leaving Chorus with a fused back, some freshly healed bones, and a shiny new leg.”

Felix shakes the bladed leg that curves from beneath his right knee. He can feel Washington’s gaze skating over his skin like ants.

“Before you ask, Locus never showed. He probably assumed that the tributary I fell in dumped me into the sea. And since I was plotting to hunt him down and kill him at the time, that was —” Felix yanks on a jammed zipper “—just fine with me. Element of surprise, you know.”

Washington makes a low sound in the back of his throat. “He grieved you.”

“Grieved me? He killed me.” Felix looks up at Washington, one brow lifted in disbelief. But nope, Washington is giving him this gross, kicked puppy look.Like Felix should be somehow moved by the whole thing.

“God, fuck off, man,” Felix mutters.

“He was miserable,” Wash argues. “He regretted it. There were times when we — when I didn't know if he'd ever be able to move past you.”

“What, mad that Locus’ guilt kept him from putting out or something? My bad,” Felix rolls his eyes, thinking of the milk sitting in the fridge; of the stacks of unfamiliar books that have replaced Felix’s favorites on the living room bookshelf. “You seem domestic enough now. Obviously he got over it.”

Washington doesn't say anything for a long moment, but Felix can feel Wash still watching him. Frustration clouds Felix’s thoughts, and he shoves things around with a little more aggression than he should. When it comes time to pack the bowie, he snarls angrily and renews his assault on the closet.

“Where are the _goddamn_  sheaths,” Felix growls, yanking down a box from a high shelf and upending it onto the floor. Several musty blankets fall out. He throws the box over his shoulder and pulls down another one.

“You're a lot skinnier than I thought you’d be,” Wash says, and it's a weird enough thing to say that it completely yanks Felix out of his mounting attack. He draws back and glares at Washington, one side of his lip curling as he struggles to come up with a response.

“You're a lot uglier than I thought you'd be,” Felix settles on, hoping he injects just the right amount of sincerity into the statement.

“Locus seems to be just fine with the way I look,” Washington says, and the worst part about it is that he doesn't even sound smug.

Felix closes his eyes and counts up and down from ten, refusing to rise to the obvious bait. He won't give him the satisfaction. Besides, he reminds himself, it's not as if he _cares_. Whoever Locus decided to fuck after Felix was out of the picture is none of his business, even if that person is as insufferable as Agent-goddamn-Washington. The two of them can die old together. He'll send them a fucking fruit basket.

But _God_ , Felix still _really_ wants to bury a knife in the freelancer’s jugular.

“Why are you still here, Wash?” He asks instead.

“I live here,” Washington retorts.

And isn't that cute.

“Bully for you,” Felix says, opening his eyes just to roll them. The _‘bitch’_ tacked to the end of the statement is unspoken, but he's sure that Washington still hears it clear as day. He zips a pocket shut with a little too much vigor.

“What are you going to do with all of that?” Washington asks, eyeing the duffle bag. Felix gives it a reassuring pat and grimaces when something inside audibly slips out of place.

“What do you think?” He looks up at Washington, who eyes him suspiciously.

Washington squints. “Kill some puppies? Start a cosmic war? Slaughter thousands of innocent people?”

“Been there, done that,” Felix dismisses, delighting in the brief flash of disgust that crosses Washington’s face.

“No change of character, huh?” Wash sounds almost disappointed. Felix hates him so much. “After everything. You don't regret —”

“Absolutely-fucking-not,” Felix interrupts.

The silence that falls over the room is, admittedly, uncomfortable. Felix isn't sure why, since a quiet Washington is most certainly the best kind of Washington (aside from a _dead_ Washington, of course; but then again, who's to say the two are mutually exclusive?). But still, there it is: an awkward fucking silence. Felix picks up the bowie and shoves the blade deep into the mattress.

“I'm gonna kill Malcom Hargrove,” he says.

“Oh,” Washington says, and then, shocked, “Wait — What?!”

“I know you fucking heard me.”

Washington actually sounds surprised. “Going after Hargrove — it's suicide.”

Felix snorts. “Obviously.”

“…You don't really seem the type.”

“Would you rather I killed you instead? It wouldn't be hard. Just say the word. Any word, really. I'm not picky.”

Washington raises his hands, the visual effect of the surrender partially negated by the gun still in his left hand.

Felix exhales, quickly scrubbing a hand over his face.

“Is there a particular reason why you care that I'm going kamikaze? I thought you'd be thrilled.”

“Why would I be thrilled?”

Felix narrows his eyes at Washington, who's giving him a dopey, wide eyed stare. Like he's genuinely confused, and like Felix is the kind of moron who'd actually believe him.

“I hate you,” Felix says. “I thought the feeling was mutual.” He faux-pouts, mimicking the wide-eyed stare. “Should I be hurt?”

Wash glares at Felix, who immediately drops the look to glare right back. The staring contest is brief. Washington breaks first, glancing up towards the roof and then down at the floor, brows furrowed. He sighs, tapping his gun against his thigh.

“You're a bastard and a psychopath, but I don't hate you, Felix,” he says.

Ouch. Felix crosses his arms and squints, unimpressed. “You're a terrible liar.”

Washington actually bristles at that, which Felix finds quite funny. Of all the things he could get angry about...

“I'm not a liar,” he growls.

Felix cocks a brow. “Oh yeah? Alright, big guy. Since when?”

“Since I decided not to be! People can do that, you know — _decide_ to change. Decide that they did bad things, _really_ bad things, but that they can use the rest of their lives trying to make up for it. Trying to be better.”

Washington goes from pissed to pleading so quickly that he just about gives Felix whiplash. He's disgustingly earnest. Felix can almost see why Locus fell for his bullshit. For the guilty, promises of redemption are the best kind of drug.

But Felix isn't guilty, so all he's really feeling right now is some severe second-hand embarrassment.

He stoops to pick up a box that had been partially kicked under the bed. “Stop preaching at me, you sound insane,” he chastises, tearing off the last bit of tape holding the box closed and upending it. “I’m supposed to be the crazy one, remember? _Psychopath_. Jesus.”

A bundle of rope, a pack of cigarettes, and more than a few nails clatter to the hardwood floor and scatter, adding to the growing mess at Felix’s feet. Felix grabs the rope and shakes it out. Washington’s expression has brightened to crimson and fury.

“I'm trying to help you!”

“Washington,” Felix says slowly. He maintains steady eye contact while he winds the robe around his open palm, feeling distantly like he's talking to a child. “I fucking hate you. And I _know_ that you hate me deep down, beneath that suffocating savior-complex of yours. And you may have a — a sicko whirlwind romance with Locus, and think that he's not all the shitty things he did, that he _changed_ or whatever bullshit you need to believe in order to sleep at night.”

Felix loops the last bit of rope around the handful he's gathered and, slipping it off his hand, expertly ties it off.

“But the world doesn't work that way,” Felix finishes, hoping his words reflect the finality that he feels as he drops the coil of rope into his bag. “People don't change.”

“We’re not together,” Washington says.

Felix’s brain stumbles over that one. “What?”

“Locus and I,” He clarifies, like that isn't a weird thing to drop into the middle of an argument about a completely unrelated, similar to a cat dropping something dead at its owner’s feet. “It isn't like that. It's just business.”

Felix shakes his head. He feels sick, the thing that had been swelling inside him deflating so quickly that it makes him dizzy. “I’m confused. Am I supposed to care or something?”

“Based on how many times you've intimated that we have some sort of romantic relationship,” Washington articulates, “I guess I just assumed that you would.”

Felix leans away from Washington. His eyes list to the side as he goes over the last few minutes, trying to pick out evidence to back up the inane suggestion that Washington is making.

With dawning horror, he realizes that he's right. The painful, full feeling rushes back in.

“It's not wrong to miss him,” Washington says softly.

“I don't,” Felix denies. “Quit saying shit like that, you sound like a freak.”

“He misses you.” Washington barrels on, “he would talk about you all the time. It used to drive me crazy. I kept telling him to get over it, you know? That him remembering you meant that you still had power over him.”

“Shut up,” Felix grits, hand white-knuckling on the strap of his bag.

“What you did to him is fucked up. Nothing can change that. But Felix,” Washington pleads. “What he did to you wasn't right either.”

And that's about all he wants to hear.

“Washington, shut the fuck up,” Felix spits. Surprisingly, Washington’s mouth closes with an audible click.

Felix watches him for a long moment, daring him to speak. He doesn't.

“You're trying to make me into a victim,” Felix says. “Into someone who hurt only as good as they got. But I'm not a victim. You wanna know why? Because I'm not,” he stabs a finger in Wash’s direction. “A good. _Person_.”

Washington still doesn't speak.

“I regret nothing that happened on Chorus,” Felix continues, “All my life I've done what I had to do to survive _and then some_ , because I fucking enjoyed it. I like hurting people. I _like_ killing people. So stop trying to make me into something you can redeem.”

Washington stares at him, frustratingly unreadable. Felix fidgets mindlessly with a frayed stitch at the end of the duffle bag’s strap.

“It's really irritating,” Felix adds.

“You like hurting people,” Washington repeats.

“Uh, _yeah_.” It's an easy answer because it's not a lie.

“But did you like hurting Locus?” Washington asks.

Felix blinks. He opens his mouth to say _yes_ , but the word sticks in his throat. That question, surprisingly, does not have such an easy answer.

“Did you like it when he hurt you?” Washington tosses aside his gun and steps forward. Felix steps back, almost stumbling over a box behind his heel. He grabs the bowie still sticking out of the mattress for support; it tears through the thick layers of foam, easy as butter.

“Okay, quit with pathetic intimidation schtick. Back the fuck up,” Felix demands, yanking the knife free and pointing it at Wash.

“Answer the question,” Wash counters, palms held up and harmlessly facing out.

He's wearing civvies. Felix eyes the bare hollow of his throat. It would be so easy to kill him. Almost effortless. One lunge forward and his knife would embed itself in Wash’s jugular, easy as anything.

But something holds him back. He tries to convince himself that it's only because arterial spray would be annoying to wash out of his bag.

“I wish I'd killed you back on Chorus,” Felix grumbles. “I can't fucking stand you.”

“You're a bad liar,” Wash muses. “Locus told me, but I didn't believe him until now. I'm honestly surprised you fooled us for so long. But… maybe it's only easy to tell because I know you.”

 _Disgusting_.

“You don't know me,” Felix scoffs.

“Don't I?” Washington tilts his head. Felix wants to smack him. “I've definitely heard enough about you to at least feel like I do.”

“Let’s pretend that that's not creepy,” Felix says, “and skip to the part where you finally leave me alone and I never have to see or hear or think about you again. Ever. Ever _ever_.”

Wash grimaces. “You're leaving?”

Felix is realizing that Washington is his own special, irritating brand of interrogator. The sudden flips of topic aren't entirely ineffective, but now that Felix knows what's going on, he's already pretty fucking sick of being thrown for a loop. 

“Okay, seriously. Mixed signals.” Felix jabs forward with his knife and Wash finally scrambles back out of his personal bubble. “What part of “killing Hargrove” do you not understand?”

“The part where it wouldn't be so dangerous if you didn't do it alone.”

It sucks because he's right.

“The fuck do you know?” Felix accuses.

Washington works his jaw, the tightness of his eyes reluctant.

“You're not the only one that Hargrove’s been targeting,” he admits.

Felix furrows his brow, squinting up at Washington until the words click into their meanings. When they do, he throws his gaze towards the ceiling and tosses up his hands.

“Oh, oh! Whoop-de-fucking-do! If Locus didn't want assassins on his ass, he shouldn't have walked out on our deal. Hargrove was pretty fucking clear about that.”

Wash crosses his arms. “So his decision to spare innocent lives and become a better person —”

“A big mistake. Ding ding ding,” Felix confirms, his voice raising to heights that even he can admit are more than a little obnoxious. But that's just fine — he's always been appreciative of the obnoxious.

Wash, on the other hand, tsks.

“You know, I'm surprised that you're still defending your decision to stick with your mission. Especially since it's what got you killed in the first place.”

Furious and hot, anger bubbles over from Felix’s veins into his skin. He lays a kick into a box beside his foot and Washington narrowly side steps it before it can sail into his crotch. Felix takes advantage of the moment of distraction to push into Washington's space and grab him by the collar of his shirt. His sadistic heart sings at Washington’s clear alarm, at the way that his hands grab at Felix’s wrists.

“ _Locus_ ,” Felix hisses, shaking Wash, “is what got me killed. The second he chose you and your group of idiots over me, it was over. Not the mission, not the bombs, not your moronic friends — Locus.”

Washington’s grip on Felix’s wrist is tight, but Felix’s own, fisted tightly in the cotton of Wash’s T-shirt, is unrelenting. “He was done with the killing, Felix, you have to see that. For years —”

Felix snorts. “Done with killing? Come on, Agent Washington. He was done with _me_.”

Washington’s hands still. His expression is carefully neutral, schooled to near perfection, but if Felix is a bad liar, then Wash is a total failure. Because behind the mask, clear as day, is something almost like pity.

Felix lets go and Wash takes a step back, rubbing at the wrinkles in his shirt. The AC has stopped humming, and the room suddenly feels stifling.

Felix turns away to pry open the bedroom window.

“It's funny,” Felix says, yanking open the window to the evening air. It goes haltingly, creaking against rust and lack of use. “When we first met, during the war — I was the one who stuck to the mission. Kept in line, didn’t try anything stupid.” The window clicks into place, and Felix easily punches out the dirt-caked screen and tosses it towards the fire escape. It misses and spirals down to the alley floor.

“Stay safe,” Felix recites, watching as the screen cracks in half against the concrete, “stay smart, stay alive at all costs. Follow the rules. Locus was the one who liked to test the waters. And now look what happened.” 

Felix turns away from the window. Washington is still watching him with that weird, uncomfortable look, so Felix concentrates on the breeze at his back instead. It's an ocean wind, warm and a bit salty.

“He decided to play by the rules, I decided I was done being told what to do, and the moment I became dispensable —”

Felix spreads his hands wide, palms up. An open shrug.

Washington exhales. “That's not fair.”

“Oh, fuck off. What are you, ten?” Felix pushes away from the window. A nail rattles across the floor when he accidentally nudges it with the toe of his boot.

“Well, it's not. He gave you an out.”

“He told me to stick to the mission.” Felix bends down and picks up the forgotten box of cigarettes. He recognizes the red box as the brand that Locus used to buy and smoke once in a blue moon. Felix lifts the folded top with his pointer finger: three left. “But he knew I wouldn't do it. So how much of an out was it, really? A way for him to avoid guilt is what it really was; ‘I tried, so it's not my fault.’ No — He knew what would happen.”

Felix tips the box back to read the label again, and then throws the box onto the mattress. It bounces once and then settles into the growing split made by Felix’s knife.

Felix looks away, but something pulls him back. He glances at the box again.

“Felix —” Washington begins.

Felix grabs both sides of the tear in the mattress and forces it even wider. The almond smell that greets him as the mattress splits in half sends an odd, almost dizzying combination of relief and dread spiraling down Felix’s veins. His hands feel chilled.

He's probably just dehydrated. Christ, he's probably so dehydrated.

Felix leans back on his heel, giving the small bricks of C4 tucked within his mattress an approving once-over. He lifts the box of cigarettes and turns it back and forth in his hands.

“Lucky,” he mutters, running a fingertip over a small bend in the side of the cardboard box.

“You were _sleeping_ on that stuff?” Washington accuses. Felix sighs.

“Look,” he says, pointedly ignoring the way Washington seems to be shuffling for a better look, “this has gone on for too long. I have places to be. Places that are off planet and far away from you, specifically.”

He shoves the cigarette box into his jacket pocket and begins extracting the C4 from his mattress, resisting a nervous hum as one begins to buzz, unbidden, in his throat.

Behind him, Washington continues to stare.

“You're not staying?” Wash asks. Felix turns around with the C4 in his arms. Washington stares at it, wide-eyed, as if Felix were planning on detonating it at that very moment. It's almost laughable. What's more pressing, unfortunately, is Washington’s severely misplaced idea of Felix’s intentions.

“What kind of — _no_ , I’m not staying. We talked about this. I have a date with Malcom and a fiery explosion somewhere in deep space, remember?”

Felix hefts the C4 a little higher to punctuate his last point. Washington actually flinches away from him with his hands raised defensively, gaze switching from the C4 to the window and back.

“Seriously?” Felix chuckles, shoving some things around in his bag as he shifts the C4 to cradle it in the crook of his arm. He really wants to ask Wash if he genuinely believes that his bare hands would be enough to stop an explosion.

“What about Locus?” Washington challenges.

“ _‘What about Locus?’_ ” Felix mocks. “What about him?” He settles the C4 into the space he's made in his duffle bag. Fuck Agent Washington and fuck his shitty attempts at mind games. “If I get out of here fast enough, he'll never know I was here.”

“What?” Washington splutters. “Why?”

“God,” Felix snaps, whirling around so quickly that his prosthetic skids over a nail. He slaps a hand down on the top of his bag, bent over as he regains his balance, and seethes. “Why _what_?!”

“Why don’t you want him to know you were here?” Washington’s hands, centered in Felix’s line of vision, fist, relax, and fist again, white-knuckled and nervous. He's got an orange bandaid wrapped around his pinky finger. “Why don't you want him to know that you're — that you're alive?”

“Because,” Felix glares at that bandaid, somehow angered by the mundanity of its existence, and sharply pushes himself upright. “I’m dead. And I'd like to stay that way, especially since I'm about to actually be dead. It's pretty lame to come back to life and then die again immediately. Besides,”

Felix zips up his duffle.

“If Locus finds out I'm alive, then he’ll know it was me that's been raiding all our safe houses, and he'll probably… Christ, I don't know, track me down and throw me off another cliff.”

Washington’s frown, impossibly, deepens. “That's not funny.”

“I'm not joking, dumbass,” Felix retorts.

Washington sighs, the sound a harsh exhale. He drags a hand through his hair. “Look, I just think —”

“Washington,” Felix interrupts. “Do not fucking tell him that I was here.”

Washington’s expression is a clear ‘why.’ Felix lifts the strap of his bag and pulls it over his shoulder, grimacing a bit as the heavy duffle knocks against his hip. His hand settles instinctively at the base of the strap.

“Don't make this harder than it has to be,” he says and steps towards the door.

Washington steps into his path.

“Why are you actually doing this, Felix?” He asks, ignoring Felix’s brusquely demanded “ _move_.” “I know it's not just because you're annoyed about assassins.”

“Why’s that?” Felix says, resisting the urge to simply shove past him.

“Because I'm pretty sure if I was dealing with the old Felix — the Felix that I know would have relished the occasional butchering of Hargrove’s soldiers — I don't think,” Washington glances down, and Felix knows without looking that he's referring to the loaded pistol tucked inside Felix’s jacket, “I would be alive right now.”

Felix wants to lift a hand and press it into his side, but that instinct was tamped out of him years ago — never confirm you're carrying by checking. As it is, the rush of clarity at Wash’s words make him dizzy. It's still hard, even now, to think about how quickly his anger had dissipated once he was dying and alone. How rapidly it became fear and a chilling realization, words only recently dug up from his deepest nightmares chronically ringing in his ears.

‘ _Only one of you needs the other to survive.’_

He'd known it was true, he just — hadn't wanted to believe it. 

Well, here's the proof. A bag full of weapons, a half-formulated plan, and an inability to keep living like he has been. Dispensable, lost, and alone. 

And maybe the thought of Locus paying for his decision over and over, never settling or recovering as Malcom Hargrove chases him to the ends of the galaxy — maybe that makes Felix sickeningly pleased. 

But maybe it also haunts him, the idea that Locus could die at the hands of someone he's so desperate to escape. 

Someone he's been running from since the goddamn war. 

“Suicide means nothing to a dead man.” Felix traces the uneven stitching decorating the part of the strap beneath his thumb. _IG. IG_. “I can at least give Locus this much.”

“Your life?” Washington asks, too gentle.

“No,” Felix actually laughs at that, at the way that Washington is handling him like he's made from spun glass. Like they haven't tried to kill each other; like they don't still want to, but can't for reasons that neither can explain. “He didn't want that. But I — if he wants freedom so badly, then one of us might as well have it.”

“Why?” Wash asks.

Words are hard and feelings are harder. Felix shrugs.

The light from the open window is fading. From somewhere distant, backdropped by the sound of the nearby sea, a wind chime rings.

“You should probably throw out the milk in the fridge,” Felix says.

He's gone before Washington can think to respond.

**Author's Note:**

> I’m not sure why I wrote this, but I had a lot of fun. I hope reading it was an equally enjoyable experience <3 
> 
> I’d like to write a sequel, but I don’t have a beta, so it takes me a while to churn these out. Hopefully I find the motivation because I love writing overly dramatic reunions.
> 
> Love to actually write one some day. Lol 
> 
> Anyways. Happy pride month! Thank you so much for reading! I’ll hopefully see you soon with a second part :)


End file.
